


Educational Decree No. 24

by Megaerakles



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Voldemort, Bickering, Dumbledore's Army, Hogwarts Fifth Year, Humor, James is still dead, Knights of Walpurgis, Lily raised Harry, Magical Contracts, Mild Language, Multi, Room of Requirement, Sirius is still a wanted man, Snark, Still roughly follows the canon timeline, This Is Incredibly Self Indulgent, Tom is still an arrogant little shit, Tom was born in 1979, Umbridge is still the worst, don't mind me, will add tags and characters as i go
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-21
Updated: 2018-04-11
Packaged: 2019-03-07 09:23:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13431753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Megaerakles/pseuds/Megaerakles
Summary: Using their wits and courage, Hermione and her friends outsmart Ministry watchdog Dolores Umbridge so that they can meet and train in secret, to prepare themselves to face rising dark forces (and of course, pass their OWLs).But the DA is not the only secret society trying to fly under the Hogwarts High Inquisitor's radar. When Tom Riddle, founder and leader of the Knights of Walpurgis, learns that Harry Potter and his friends have found a haven from the authorities' eyes, he is determined to get their secret--even if it means opening negotiations with that stubborn muggle-born witch who is constantly threatening to beat his test scores.Or, I thought it would be funny if Dumbledore's Army and the Knights of Walpurgis had to learn to share.





	1. Educational Decree No. 24

**Author's Note:**

> This is something I've been working on for awhile. Originally was supposed to be a one-shot, but it eventually made more sense to break it up, and I've finally gotten the first part ready! 
> 
> I tend to work on this when I have writer's block on my WIP, so the next part might take awhile.

_“All Student Organisations, Societies, Teams, Groups, and Clubs are henceforth disbanded. An Organisation, Society, Team, Group, or Club is hereby defined as a regular meeting of three or more students. Permission to reform may be sought from the High Inquisitor (Professor Umbridge). No Student Organisation, Society, Team, Group or Club my exist without the knowledge and approval of the High Inquisitor. Any student found to have formed or to belong to an Organisation, Society, Team, Group, or Club that has not been approved by the High Inquisitor will be expelled. The above is in accordance with educational decree number 24.”_

Hermione’s heart sank lower and lower as she read Umbridge’s latest decree aloud to Harry and Ron. It was obviously targeted at the three of them and the meeting they’d hosted last weekend in Hogsmeade. How in the world had that _hag_ heard about it?

“What does this mean?” Ron said, much too loudly. “She can’t mean our Defense—”

“Study Group!” Hermione interrupted quickly, glancing around to make sure no one was listening. She caught Pansy Parkinson’s beady eyes for a moment before the Slytherin girl turned away. “Where I tutor you and Harry after Umbridge’s classes every week…”

“Yes. Maybe she’s mad I’m improving in her class; you know how she feels about me,” Harry added loudly; he looked her in the eyes and gave her a small nod, letting her know he’d realized what she was up to. The middle of a crowd of students from all four houses was not the ideal time and place to discuss such a sensitive matter as their attempted rebellion, after all.

“We should go to breakfast,” Hermione said firmly, looping one arm through each of the boys’ and starting to pull them along. The other students parted for them, and once they were a little ways down the corridor, Harry muttered softly,

“How did she find out, do you think? Did someone tell?”

Hermione shook her head. “No, I don’t think so; if they had, we would know…”

Both of the boys looked puzzled, and Ron asked, “What do you mean?”

Hermione cringed slightly. She’d not yet figured out a way to casually bring up her little “safety measure” yet. She didn’t think they’d be proud, at least, not in a way she wanted people to be proud of her. “It’s… not important. I’ll explain later.”

They’d reached the Great Hall, so she released her friends’ arms and strode over to their customary place at the Gryffindor table. Once they were seated, she glanced up at Harry and noticed him directing a sour look towards the staff table, where the pink toad in question was smiling smugly and sipping tea out of a dainty china teacup.

“What are we going to do?” he muttered as his jaw clenched visibly. “Her reign is getting more and more draconian…”

“Speaking of dragons,” Ron mumbled around a bite of toast, “look over at the Slytherin table.” He pointed a finger and Hermione’s eyes followed his gesture until they landed on a certain head of white-blonde hair. “Malfoy sure looks like he’s in a good mood. Wonder if _he_ had anything to do with, slimy git...”

The Slytherin Prefect in question happened to look their way just then, and when he saw them looking, his customary smirk turned into a nasty sneer. He was surrounded by his usual gang of hanger-ons, including Pansy Parkinson, who’d slid herself into the seat next to him and was clinging onto his arm, whispering something into his ear. She too looked towards the trio of Gryffindors and grinned nastily. Hermione suspected she must be relating that slight hint Ron had revealed in the hallway.

“Just watch him take advantage of this, somehow,” Ron said after he had swallowed. He jabbed his finger in the direction of their table, and Hermione realized he was gearing up for another one of his long-winded anti-Slytherin rants. “Those slimy, weaselly Slytherins can’t go an hour without thinking about how to get ahead! They don’t care who else they throw under the hippogriff’s hooves in the process, not even if it leads to a madman taking over the world--”

“Apparently not all the Slytherins are happy about this, though,” Harry interrupted, cutting their friend off before he could really get going. He nodded over towards the end of the table opposite Malfoy, where the other half of the Slytherin fifth years sat. In the very center of the clump a dark-haired young man was currently sending a dark glare towards the Prefect of his own house. “Take a look at Riddle; I don’t think I’ve ever seen him look so angry. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him show that much emotion at all; he’s usually such a robot.”

Ron laughed heartily around another mouthful of food. “Yeah! That’s a perfect description! Riddle’s a row-beet… Er, what’s that, again?”

As Harry sighed and began re-explaining that aspect of muggle culture to Ron, Hermione took a closer look at Tom Riddle. He was something of an enigma within the walls of Hogwarts. Tall, dark and handsome, almost every girl and many of the guys lusted over him (the ones that weren’t too busy throwing themselves at Malfoy, anyway). One of the smartest members of their class, he rivaled both Hermione and Malfoy for the highest marks on any given paper or exam. He’d always found ways of subtly kissing up to the teachers, and had become a veritable teacher’s pet in a way that Hermione had never managed. But despite the fact that his beauty and his brains could have made him one of the most popular students in Hogwarts, he always seemed to hold himself apart from the crowd. He projected an air of distant aloofness, only ever interacting regularly with the handful of other Slytherins he counted as his friends.

Harry was right though, she thought, as she examined his expression. His usual emotionless mask was gone, and had been replaced by an intense anger that sent chills up Hermione’s spine, even from across the room and directed away from her. Was it possible that the tensions that had been slowly brewing within Slytherin house between Riddle and Malfoy’s factions since first year were finally coming to a boiling point, and over one of Umbridge’s insane rules, too? Well, Hermione was glad she wouldn’t have to be in their common room when that happened.

Although that did beg the question, what was so offensive to Riddle about this particular Decree? She tried to remember if he was in any clubs or organizations that would be affected by the edict, but she came up blank. He wasn’t on the Quidditch team, and the thought of someone as self-important as him joining the Gobstones club was almost laughable. Perhaps he had an actual study group or something that met regularly, but surely Umbridge interfering with that wouldn’t make him so… furious.

At exactly the wrong moment, Riddle decided to turn his glare away from Malfoy. His eyes flitted across the Hall before landing on her own. When their gazes met, his eyes narrowed, as if daring her to continue looking. Not one to be intimidated, Hermione kept staring at him, keeping her expression one of casual, indifferent observance. If she looked away, he might think she was embarrassed to be caught looking, which she wasn’t; she wasn’t some simpering schoolgirl with a crush. She was a strategist, trying to gain a better understanding of her opponent.  

Riddle seemed disinclined to back down either, so they stared at each other for over thirty seconds before Blaise Zabini said something that got his attention. Hermione sighed and looked down at her plate, once again wondering what his problem could possibly be. Tom Riddle was _never_ phased, by anything…

She was snapped back to the present when Angelina Johnson came up to talk with Harry and a couple of the Hufflepuffs who’d been at the meeting attempted to wave Hermione over. They had a much more pressing matter to deal with than whatever drama was happening in the Snakes’ dungeon, so she shoved all thoughts of Riddle and his strange reaction into the back of her mind, and began to think of ways to fix their problem. It wasn’t as if it affected her, anyway.

**—0—**

When Dobby came to them with the idea of the Room of Requirement, Hermione was admittedly skeptical, and felt obligated to voice initial doubts and concerns about safety. But once they started holding meetings, she reveled in the fact that they’d found the _perfect_ space for their illicit lessons. It grew to hold as many members of the newly-christened Dumbledore’s Army as could make it to a meeting, it always furnished itself with whatever objects and tools would be most suited to Harry’s lesson plans, and its magic could be relied upon to keep Umbridge and any spies she might have out. Add in the enchanted Galleons she’d thought up to arrange meeting times and their stint as rule-breakers was going off without a hitch.

Alas, their peace and security was not to last.

Three weeks had passed since the Decree and the start of the DA meetings. She’d taken on much of the organizing responsibilities for working out when meetings should be held, which ended up being a lot of extra work, making the times she set aside for her own private studies and schoolwork all the more sacred. So when she was sitting in her private corner of the library revising for a Charms exam and _he_ approached her, casting a shadow over her textbooks and loudly clearing his throat, she was not in the best of moods.

“What do you want, Riddle?” She asked, knowing who it was without even looking up from her book. He was the only other student who ever came this far back in the stacks, although usually when they were both here they had an unspoken agreement to ignore the other’s presence.

“Tell me how you’re doing it,” he said brusquely, skipping over any sort of pleasantries one might expect when you intend to demand something of someone you’ve only ever spoken to to mock or compare test scores to for the five years you’ve known them.

Hermione raised an eyebrow and lazily turned the page. “Beating you in Care of Magical Creatures?” she said, still not bothering to honor him with her full attention. Maybe if he’d be even the slightest bit civil with her... “It’s called not being a pompous git towards the professor.”

“Oh, not _that_ , I’d only actually care if we had a _competent_ teacher.” Without an invitation, Riddle pulled out the chair next to hers and sat down in it before placing one of his large pale hands over the pages to obscure her view of the text. “I want to know how Potter and your friends are getting around that _toad_ Umbridge and Malfoy’s lackeys.”  

It took all of her willpower, but Hermione was able to stop herself from having a physical reaction to his accusation, which would have given them away at once. Instead, she sighed heavily and carefully creased the corner of the page in her textbook before closing it and gingerly folding her hands on top of it, finally looking up at Tom Riddle with wide and innocent eyes. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

She caught a flicker of annoyance in his eyes, which was about the greatest extent of emotion he usually showed. “Don’t play dumb, Granger, it doesn’t suit you. Black heard your inane roommates gossiping about it in the loo.”

Hermione gritted her teeth slightly; it was just like Lavender and Parvati to forget how dire their situation was and let something slip when they shouldn’t. If they were just talking between themselves, her safety-measure wouldn’t have taken effect. And if Riddle was already convinced they were meeting, she doubted she’d be able to dissuade his notorious single-mindedness. But that didn’t mean she was going to just give up their secrets; she would have to deflect. “Honestly, Riddle, that’s none of your business. I’m not even in charge, Harry is leading, so if you want to discuss this you should—”

“I don’t what to talk to _Potter_ ,” he snapped, cutting her off. “I’ve come to _you_. Tell me, or I’ll tell Umbridge you’re still meeting without permission.”

Hermione raised an eyebrow. “Do you have any proof of that? Aside from supposed lavatory gossip, I mean. Because if not, they can’t do anything more than keep a close eye on us, and I can’t _imagine_ them keeping any closer of an eye on Harry than they do already.”

Riddle was silent, and she could see his jaw clench slightly. She couldn’t help but smirk. “That’s what I thought.”

Suddenly he switched tactics, allowing an oh-so-charming smiles to slide across his features and leaning slightly closer so she could see the light glinting off his pearly white teeth. “There has to be a way we can come to some sort of an understanding, Granger,” he said in a voice that was suddenly laden with honey. “Is there anything I could do for you that requires more… finesse than a Gryffindor typically possess?”

Hermione scoffed and opened her mouth, about to reject his offer on principle alone, but paused as she remembered a dilemma she’d been having recently. She really shouldn’t tell him, especially without consulting Harry and Ron about it first, but the DA was not the only thing she was juggling right now. She’d been working on a side project intended to help Harry strengthen his defenses against his enemies, but had recently come across an obstacle she hadn’t yet figured out how to surmount. Protecting Harry was the top priority, even more so than passing their O.W.L.s, she knew that. And Riddle wasn’t _with_ Malfoy and Umbridge; for whatever reason, he was just as against them at the moment as Hermione and her friends were. And while this enemy of their enemy was definitely not their friend, he _was_ someone who could do things that others couldn’t. They could use him. Besides, it wasn’t as if she were the only source of the information about the DA or the Room. There were dozens of other members, after all, and he could probably manipulate some of them into giving up the secret. If she were the one doing the negotiations, at least she maintained some control over the situation, and got something out of it as well.

She chewed her bottom lip for a moment before saying hesitantly, “Actually… There’s a book I want, but… it’s in the Restricted section, and with Umbridge’s latest decree about extracurricular material, I can’t get permission.”

“And your _boyfriend_ can’t get it for you?” Riddle sneered. “I know that Potter’s always sneaking out after hours and getting into places he shouldn’t.”

Hermione rolled her eyes, not even bothering to wonder how Riddle knew that; he had the uncanny knack of gaining sensitive information. “Malfoy’s got his goons parked outside of the Gryffindor Common Room every night so he can’t get out like he used to,” she explained. After a moment she muttered, “And Harry’s _not_ my boyfriend, why does everyone think that?”

“Skeeter’s article last year—” Riddle stopped and shook his head once. “It doesn't matter. Write down the name of this book, and I can get you a copy.”

Hermione pulled out a scrap of parchment and picked up her quill, then scribbled down the name of the tome she was after. As soon as she was done, Riddle snatched the paper out from in front of her and folded it, not even sparing it a glance before shoving it into his pocket. Then he pushed back his chair and stood up, fixing her with another one of his dazzling grins.

“Well, it’s been lovely, Granger,” he said, sarcasm dripping from his tone. “We’ll talk again soon enough.”

He’d turned and walked away before she could manage any sort of reply. As she watched his retreating figure, she couldn't help but feel a knot of anxiety form in her throat. She wasn’t at all sure about giving up the DA’s secret to the likes of Tom Riddle. It wasn’t that he was their enemy, exactly; he wasn’t attempting to establish an educational dictatorship like Umbridge and the Ministry, nor was he allied with the murderous Dark Prince like Malfoy and his pure-blood cohorts were. But there was no love lost between Riddle and Harry, and the rest of Gryffindor House for that matter.

She might hate Divination, but even she could predict that things were about to get dramatically more difficult.

**—0—**

“What’s your interest in Occlumency?”

Hermione looked up from her potions essay as Riddle once again sidled up to her in her secluded study spot. This time, he had his school bag slung over his shoulder, and from it he pulled out a large book and placed it in front of her on the table. She blinked in surprise as she looked at what appeared to be an old, worn, first edition printing of _Magicks of The Mind_ by Cavalier Vaughn.

She carefully opened the cover and flipped through the first few pages, confirming that it was indeed the book she was after—and was that the author’s signature inside the cover? “How on earth did you get this so quickly?” She finally sputtered, closing the book and looking back up at the haughty Slytherin. It had only been two days since their last conversation, she hadn’t even brought up the idea of telling Riddle about the Room of Requirement to Harry and Ron yet!

Riddle inspected his fingernails, the picture of nonchalance. “I have my ways. Why do you want this book?”

Hermione scowled at him, feeling a surge of annoyance at his promptness. She’d been putting off _that_ conversation with her friends, sure that the difficulty of getting the book would give her more time to figure out the best way to broach the subject. “Is that the question you want me to answer?”

Riddle sighed. “No, I suppose not. Tell me how you’re outsmarting Umbridge.”

Hermione bit her lip. “Well… I actually haven’t talked to Harry about this yet; he’s the one who found our meeting spot, so I should probably see what he thinks before I tell—”

“You should have thought of that before taking the book, then, Granger.” Riddle snapped. “I went through a lot of trouble to get that, you know. You _owe_ me now.”

Hermione stared down at the rare book in front of her, knowing it contained important knowledge she needed if she was going to help Harry overcome his most recent problems with the Dark Prince. But was that worth giving up the DA’s secret meeting spot to someone as self-serving and dubious as Tom Riddle?

But then, there were certainly plenty members of the group she already didn’t trust, not fully. That’s what the parchment had been for. Perhaps that would be enough insurance against Riddle spilling their secret, as well?

“I… think I can tell you,” she said hesitantly, “but… you would have to sign your name first. So would any of your friends you’re going to tell.”

Riddle’s expression was guarded as he looked at her suspiciously. “Sign my name. On what?”

Hermione bit her lip, not wanting to say too much in case he refused. Finally she settled on, “Just a list. A special one. Everyone who knows has signed it.”

Riddle’s eyes narrowed and he held out hand. “Let me see it.”

Hermione scoffed. As if she’d just hand over the list of members of their secret organization for him to walk off with! “Not here! We’d have to meet specially, somewhere we couldn’t be chanced upon. Besides, I don’t even have it with me.” Did he think she was stupid enough to carry something like that around?

Riddle scowled and muttered, “This is unbelievable!” In the blink of an eye, he’d snatched up the book again, slipping it back into his bag. “I’m taking this back until we get this worked out,” he declared, his tone making it clear that she’d caused him a grave inconvenience.

Hermione rolled her eyes. “If you must.”

“Do you know about the secret room on the fifth floor?” Hermione shook her head. “It’s behind the suit of armor that’s missing an arm,” Riddle informed her. “You have to knock on its helmet three times and it’ll open. I’ll be waiting there tomorrow after classes end, and we can do this then. Don’t keep me waiting.”

He left as abruptly as he’d come. When she was sure he was gone, she allowed her head to fall forward onto the table and groaned softly. Just what had she gotten herself into?  

**—0—**

“And _when_ , exactly, were you going to run this by me?” Harry nearly shouted at her as she finished explaining the situation with Riddle.

“Well, um… now,  I suppose,” she said weakly. “And _please_ be quieter; you’ll wake everyone up.” She and Harry were sitting up late in the Gryffindor Common Room, waiting for Ron to get back from a detention with Umbridge. Once the other students had cleared out, Hermione had decided to just rip off the band-aid and get the conversation over with. Perhaps then she wouldn’t spend all day with guilt nagging at the back of her mind.

Harry stood up from his chair and started pacing around the room, gesturing wildly with his hands. “I didn’t even want to do this in the first place, you know! _You_ talked me into it,” he cried, jabbing a finger in her direction. “And now on top of dealing with Umbridge the Ministry and Sanus and Malfoy, we’ve got to somehow trust _Tom_ bloodly _Riddle?_ This is the last thing I need right now! The git’s insufferable!”

Hermione sighed and closed her eyes for a moment, reaching up to massage her aching temples. With the stress of dealing with this secret Defense class business and the situation with Riddle on top of her usual schoolwork, she’d had a tension headache all day, and Harry’s shouting was only making it worse. “Look, I know you two don’t get along—”

“Understatement of the century, ‘Mione,” Harry growled, throwing himself back down on the armchair, his eyes simmering with anger. “He hates my guts. And the feeling is mutual!”

Hermione rolled her eyes “Whatever. The thing is, if we don’t give him what he wants, but on our terms, then he’s going to find some way to make this all come falling down. It’s like the saying: keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.”

Harry scoffed. “Whoever made that saying up clearly never had to suffer through shared lessons with Tom Riddle. But _fine_. I suppose you’re right. Riddle hates Umbridge as much as we do. And he’s such a nerd that for all we know, he wants a space to do the same thing we’re doing.”

Hermione hummed in response, not wanting to say what she thought about that. It had of course crossed her mind to wonder about what Riddle was so desperate to get a secret space for, and she didn’t think having secret Defense lessons was it. While the lack of proper teaching this year must be getting to him as much as it was to her, he wasn’t the sort to need a teacher or well-structured lessons to learn something; he’d annoyingly always been a natural at DADA, on par with Harry. If anything, he would be the one teaching, and she had a hard time seeing him overly concerned with his friends’ O.W.L.s. No, she suspected his intent was a lot less… wholesome than the DA’s. She’d sometimes gotten a disturbing vibe off of some of his friends, and there had been all those rumors… The strange attacks second year, But she shouldn’t dwell; it wasn’t as if a few fifth years could pose more of a threat than the Dark Prince, after all.

“Anyway, tell me more about this book, and why it’s so important for you to read,” Harry said as he stared into the fireplace, watching the flames dance. Perhaps he was hoping for another secret floo call from home.  

Hermione eagerly seized on the change of subject, knowing that this would be something Harry would find compelling. “Well, you know how you’ve been having so many nightmares about your father’s death lately?”

“I might recall waking up every other night in cold sweat after seeing the life leave my father’s eyes, yes,” Harry responded dryly.

“What if I said I’d thought of a way to stop them?” 

**—0—**

“I am _not_ signing my name on a piece of paper that says ‘Dumbledore’s Army’ at the top!” Riddle snapped, shoving Hermione’s enchanted parchment back at her. “I’m not interested in _joining_ Potter’s club, I just want to know _where_ in Salazar’s name you’re having your meetings!”

“And I’ll tell you, you just have to sign this parchment first!” Hermione snapped, crossing her arms and refusing to take it from him.

She’d come to the secret room, which was about the size of a generous broom closet, as soon as classes were done. With no time to go back to Gryffindor Tower before the meeting, she’d been forced carry the DA membership list around with her in her school bag. It wasn’t as if they were now conducting random searches of the students’ belongings (yet), and she wasn’t in the habit of losing papers, but she had still been paranoid all day that somehow, it was going to get out and into the wrong hands. The trouble she had taken and the danger she’d put herself and her friends in left her with little patience for this boy’s _whining_ about something as silly as the title on the parchment!

Riddle’s eyes narrowed as he looked down and inspected the list once more. “What curse did you place on it?” he asked after a minute.

Hermione’s brows shot up for a moment, but then she shook herself; she shouldn’t be surprised that Riddle had figured it out. He was almost as clever as she was. And her insistence on him signing it should be dubious to all but the most gullible first-years.  “Nothing too nasty. It’s just a little something that’ll ensure you don’t tell our secrets,” she replied.

Riddle frowned. “My word isn’t good enough?”

Hermione raised her eyebrows as she leaned back against the stone wall. “Name one time in the past four and a half years you or your friends have given me any reason to trust you.”

“Fair enough,” he conceded after a moment of silence, “But I’m still not signing up for Potter’s Dumbledore fan club, and neither will my friends. How about you make _another_ cursed parchment without the stupid title, and we’ll sign that one.”

Hermione rolled her eyes, but she reached into her bag and pulled out her spare roll of parchment. She tore off a section and then sank to the ground, smoothing the paper out on the floor and pulling out her wand. “This is going to take a minute,” she informed Riddle, glancing up at him. He just shrugged and leaned back, gesturing for her to continue. So she turned her concentration onto her work, muttering the incantations she’d developed under her breath and weaving the threads of magic into the paper that would give it the properties of a magical contract.

Once she’d finished, she stowed her wand, stood up, and held out the newly-enchanted parchment to Riddle. To her confusion, he was smirking, his eyes glinting with amusement. “That was a particularly… inventive curse you cast just now. Do the people who’ve signed that list know about it?”

Her silence seemed to give him all the answer he needed, and his smirk grew wider. “Why, Hermione Granger, you _bad_ girl,” he said, in a voice that was almost a purr. “I’m actually impressed! Being sneaky, tricking your friends into entering such a brutal magical contract. What _would_ your precious Potter say?”

Hermione desperately wanted to smack him with something, but the closest object at hand was a piece of parchment, and that certainly wouldn’t leave a mark, so she did her best to stamp out the urge. “Just take it and sign,” she said through gritted teeth. It wasn’t as if she was proud of her safeguard, despite it being necessary; Tom Riddle, Slytherin extraordinaire, complimenting her on it was not helping her feel at peace with her decision.

“Those incantations, they’re based off of an archaic form of the Unbreakable Vow, are they not?” he asked as he took the parchment from her hands and began inspecting it.

Hermione sighed and nodded, finding herself the _tiniest_ bit impressed that he’d been able to pick up on that. “Yes, but I stripped them of their lethal components, _obviously_.”

 Riddle shrugged. “Either way. I’m not judging you; at times like these, loyalty is something that must be ensured, at all costs. Now that I see we’re on the same page about that, I actually feel that much better about working with you,” he said, flashing her a devious grin.

She stared at him. He was joking. He _had_ to be joking. He was making fun of her for having qualms about methods that she had no doubt he’d employ in a heartbeat. “I don’t appreciate your sass,” she spat, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “I don’t know what _you_ are up to, but the problems that me and my friends are dealing with affect the future of our entire _society_.”

Riddle folded up the blank parchment and slid it into his bag, before looking at her and asking quietly, “You think my friends and I aren’t concerned with wizarding society?”

Hermione scoffed. “Not really, no; forgive me if I can’t picture the members of a house known for their self-serving natures and willingness to backstab others being such altruistic citizens.”

Riddle frowned. “You have quite a… narrow view of Slytherin House, I must say. Aren’t you supposed to be all open-minded and understanding?”

She couldn’t help but scowl at him. How dare _he_ try to critique her on this. “Oh, I try to be; it’s just difficult to want to understand a group known for producing nothing but bigots and dark wizards!”

He scowled right back at her. “Well if that’s what you see us as, I suppose I won’t waste my time trying to change your mind. However, if you or the rest of Potter’s minions are this…antagonistic while we work out the rest of our collaboration, then I’m afraid that I shall cease making an effort to be civil!”

Wait, he’d been ‘civil’ up until now? “Oh, I’m sorry,” Hermione said, rolling her eyes again. “It must be _soooo_ difficult to have to come to us mean, callous Gryffindors for help. Sorry for not falling at your feet and worshipping the ground you walk on like everyone else; I’ll try to do better in the future.” She smiled at him, making it as wide and false as her face could manage. “Shall I curtsy and kiss your ring, My Lord?”

She watched Riddle’s jaw clench and unclench as his eyes simmered with irritation. After a moment, he spoke through clenched teeth. “Very well; if you refrain from ‘sass’, then so will I.” He turned away from her and reached an arm out towards the wall, which he knocked on three times with his fist. As it began to slide and reveal the passage back into the castle, he said, “I intend to follow our negotiations through till the end, you know, and continuously insulting me isn’t going to drive me off; it’s just going to make our interactions less pleasant.” He didn’t look at her again as he stepped out of the door and stomped away from her.

“Because they’re such a cake walk to begin with,” Hermione muttered as she shouldered her bag again and followed him out. She stepped into the corridor just in time to see his robes disappearing around the corner, presumably heading off to the dungeons to plot nefarious schemes or whatever it was he did for fun.

As she began to make her way back to Gryffindor tower, she pondered the situation. Once again, she was forced to ask herself what Riddle could possibly be after. He clearly didn’t get any enjoyment out of talking to her, so only a great need could have driven him to seek her out, to compromise with her, to enter into a magical contract with her, and even (by his own claim) attempt to be ‘civil’. Whatever it was, he must have decided he had no other course of action; Godric only knew how desperate Tom Riddle must be if he was willing to sign her cursed parchment.

**—0—**

When Hermione ducked into the second floor lavatory between her afternoon classes two days after her meeting with Riddle, it was strangely empty for such a busy time. She paid that fact little mind though, until she was washing her hands at the sink and Tracey Davis entered the bathroom, walking straight up to Hermione.

Skipping over any formalities, Davis produced a rolled up piece of parchment from her bag and held it out. “Granger, this is for you. Tom wants to know how soon you can meet with him again.”

Hermione was a little taken aback by her abruptness, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as Riddle himself; her tone was more business-like and straightforward than arrogant and demanding. So she sighed, and after turning off the faucet and drying her hands, she took the parchment from Davis’ hand. When she unrolled it she saw that in addition to Riddle’s neatly curving signature at the top of the page there were five other names scrawled onto the parchment: Blaise Zabini, Theodore Nott, Benedict Lestrange, Carina Black, and Tracey Davis. Riddle’s friends. They weren’t Hermione’s favorite classmates by any means, but they were somewhat preferable to the Slytherins who hung out with Malfoy, like Parkinson, or Crabbe and Goyle.

“This is everyone who he’s going to tell about our room?” Hermione asked as she rolled the parchment back up and slipped it into her own bag. Later she would have to double check her enchantments to make sure Riddle hadn’t tampered with them. She wouldn't put it past him or his friends to try and work their way around her contract.

Davis nodded, still watching Hermione expectantly. Hermione pulled another scrap of parchment from her bag and quickly scribbled down a time and location and then handed it over. “Tell him to come alone for the first time, and to make sure he’s not followed up to the seventh floor. If for some reason he can’t make that time tonight, I’ll be waiting there tomorrow, same time.”

“Understood.” Davis didn’t even glance at the paper before pocketing it, turning around, and leaving the lavatory. As Hermione watched the girl’s long blonde braid disappear through the doorway, she couldn’t help but feel a knot of anxiety forming in her throat. Once she showed Tom Riddle the Room of Requirement and he brought his friends there, there would be no going back. Their secret would be that much less secure, there would be six more potential leaks, even with her jinx on the parchment…

**—0—**

That afternoon was not a pleasant one for Hermione; Harry had not been happy with her when she told him she was showing Riddle the Room that night, and Ron, whom she’d purposely neglected to tell about the whole business, had to be informed, and was now not speaking to her. Dinner was silent and tense, and Hermione left the Great Hall well before anyone else had finished their meal, deciding to go early to meet Riddle. She was expecting to be standing at the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy for a good ten minutes before he arrived, but when she finished making the climb up the moving staircases, it was to find him already there, leaning against the blank expanse of wall right where the door to the Room would appear.

“You’re early,” she said once she was within earshot.

He smirked as she approached. “So are you.” His tone was smug and amused, but not as angry as she expected it to be, given how they’d last parted.

“Did you bring my Occlumency book?” she asked, stopping in front of him and crossing her arms.

Riddle nodded. “I’ll hand it over as soon as you bring me to your meeting room.”

Hermione grinned. This part was going to be fun. “I already have.”

Riddle furrowed his brow and frowned slightly. “I’m afraid I don’t take your meaning.”

Rather than explain, Hermione started walking, making her first pass in front of the door before spinning around to make the second, thinking over and over again, _I need to show Tom Riddle what he’s looking for_.

“Granger, what are you doing?”

Still not replying, she spun on her heels again to make the third pass.

“If you’re trying to make a joke, I must warn you that I don’t— _bloody hell_!”

The stone wall behind Riddle had suddenly transformed into a door, causing him to fall backwards about an inch. He pushed himself off of it and took a step back, gaping at the newly materialized entrance.

“If I may,” Hermione said, slipping her body between him and the door and pushing it open. The Room was smaller than it became for DA meetings, but there were about twice as many bookshelves. The walls were now hung with green and silver tapestries, likely to honor the intended users of this room, and in the center there was a raised dais, on which an elegant black table with six high-backed chairs was placed.

Riddle was standing in the doorway, speechless and slack-jawed, so Hermione took the opportunity to investigate one of the nearby shelves, curious to see what sort of books the Room had selected for Riddle. Just scanning the titles caused her to frown. They appeared to deal with subjects she’d only ever seen mentioned in the Restricted section… rather _dark_ it seemed to her…

“What is this place?”

She turned around and saw that Riddle had finally stopped gawking long enough to shut the door and begin to explore the room. He’d made it onto the dais and was standing with one hand on the back of a chair.

“It’s called the Come-and-Go Room, or the Room of Requirement,” Hermione explained, going over to stand by him. “It takes the shape of whatever a person has need of when they walk past it. And this,” she said, gesturing to the room around them, “Is apparently what you need. That’s what I asked for, anyway.”

“So it doesn’t look like this for you?”

Hermione shook her head. “No, can you imagine twenty five people stunning each other in here? It can get a lot bigger. Or a lot smaller; Fred and George say they’ve hidden in it as a broom closet once.”

A slow grin was spreading across Riddle’s face as he turned around, his eyes passing over everything as if he were savoring the sight.

“No one else knows about this?” he asked.

“Only Dumbledore and Dobby the house elf, as far as I know,” Hermione said. “And neither of them are inclined to share secrets with Umbridge.

A brief shadow had crossed Riddle’s face when she mentioned Dumbledore, but it was gone in a second. “Well, Granger, I must admit,” he said, shaking his head, “I had my doubts about what you could deliver, but I’m pleased to have been proved so very wrong.” Riddle reached into his bag and pulled out the Occlumency book and handed it to her. “I’m more than happy to let you have this now; it’s yours to keep.”

Hermione nodded and stowed it away. Reading it, mastering it, and then somehow getting Harry to learn it would be her next major side project. She was sure that it would take a lot of time and effort; thank Merlin she and Riddle had finished their negotiations and he would stop randomly accosting her in the Library…

“This is… perfect,” she heard him mutter, half to her and half to himself. “To think Potter discovered something so amazing about this castle before me. I wonder how soon I can get a meeting set up? Maybe Wednesday, if Slughorn doesn’t assign another essay…“

“Umm…” Hermione crossed her arms in front of her chest as he turned to look at her. “I’m afraid you can’t have a meeting here Wednesday night; the DA’s having our own meeting then.”

Riddle’s expression quickly soured as he matched his stance. “I see. And just how often do you use this Room? Because I have things I need to do as well; long-term projects that we need to get set up and restarted, sensitive matters I need to discuss with my friends in absolute privacy…”

Hermione scowled at him. “That’s all well and good, but you know, we were here first, and we’re not going to be pushed on your whim.”

“Granger, I _need_ this Room.”

“And so do we!”

The two of them glared at each other for a long minute before Riddle sighed and said, very reluctantly, “It appears that we will have to come to some sort of… scheduling arrangement.”

“The DA doesn’t have a set schedule, we call meetings on a week to week basis,” Hermione informed him stiffly.

He closed his eyes, and his next words sounded heavily forced out. “Well then, I suppose we’ll have to… meet up every week, and… discuss it.”

And just like that, Hermione found herself faced with dealing with Tom Riddle for the foreseeable future.


	2. Part Two: Dumbledore's Army

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've decided that instead of waiting to publish the whole "Part 2" together (which is turning out to be sorta long), I'm going to post the smaller sections as they're ready. They're not exactly what I think of as "chapters", but I thought shorter but more frequent updates would be better. 
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy the continuation of this kinda-serious-but-not-really-at-all fic :)

If Hermione had thought attempting to schedule the DA meetings around the needs of their members had been difficult, adding Tom Riddle and his goons to the mix was enough to make her consider whether expulsion would be really all that bad if it meant being freed from this torture. To hell with the wizarding world, she’d revert to her ten-year-old self’s plan of becoming an astronaut.  

But then she remembered that there was a Dark Wizard on the loose and that Harry was her best friend and currently a target, and that the members of the DA were counting on Harry to teach them defense and Harry was counting on _her_ to get all of this worked out, and she somehow found the resolve to just grit her teeth and endure it all.

So she asked each member of the DA individually about their anticipated conflicts, made charts and tables and color coded everything, put it all together in a folder that she enchanted with eight different security spells, and brought it with her to that secret room Riddle insisted they meet in. He didn’t think they should be going to the actual Room outside of their meetings, as that would minimize the risk of their secret being discovered; she thought he was being paranoid, but that was besides the point. Every Saturday evening found her sneaking off to seclude herself in a tiny room with Tom Riddle so that they could argue over scheduling.

Hermione had once off-handedly complained about the situation to Lavender and Parvati, and those two _idiots_ had insinuated that she and Riddle might be doing something _else_ together there. After that, they had been given excellent opportunity to practice putting up shields against unfriendly spells at a moments notice.

They hadn’t succeeded.

But Hermione almost wished they were right, because sneaking away to snog some boy—a _different_ boy, not Tom Riddle—would be far preferable to what she actually did. Their first meeting had been an unmitigated disaster. Crabbe had quite unsubtly followed her as she left the library, so she’d been forced to lose him by ducking through increasingly obscure side-corridors. By the time she’d arrived at the secret room, it was fifteen minutes past when they’d agreed to meet. Of course Riddle just _couldn’t_ let it go even after hearing her excuse, and had berated her about ‘disrespecting his time’ for almost five minutes before she could convince him to actually get on with business.

And once they’d started trying to work it out, he’d had a problem with every single one of her proposed schedules. She’d initially stated that Harry wanted to hold the DA meeting on either Monday or Thursday, depending on homework assignments, and that Riddle could take his pick of any and all of the remaining nights. But Riddle wouldn’t take Tuesday because there was a Charms exam the next day, Wednesday night was unacceptable because Lestrange had Quidditch practice, Friday night didn’t suit him for “personal reasons” he refused to disclose, and that next weekend was too far away and simply out of the question.

So she’d started trying to decide which of her nights Riddle would take, and that hadn’t gone any smoother. He apparently thought he needed _both_ of them, and tried to talk _her_ into taking the nights she’d already ruled out! She wasn’t entirely certain he hadn’t done that just to tick her off. After almost an hour of arguing, they eventually reached a compromise, which was good because any longer stuck in that broom closet and she would have strangled him.

She’d hoped it would go smoother as they went along, but no such luck. Every single week, he’d inevitably find some new way to be unreasonable and draw out their meetings to unnecessary lengths as they argued. Honestly, one would think someone who so clearly despised her would do anything to lessen the amount of time they had to be stuck together, but _noooo_ ; he actually seemed to relish in making her murderous.    

It didn’t help that whenever Hermione tried to complain about him to Harry and Ron, she had to endure a chorus of ‘I told you so’s before getting any sort of pity. Harry at least seemed to have become resigned to the situation and limited himself to one or two bitter remarks, but Ron, while generally speaking to her again, still got frosty anytime she mentioned Riddle and couldn’t resist letting her know how he _could have_ _told her_ she’d be miserable. She’d _known_ what she was getting into, honestly, she just wanted a bit of sympathy!  

But maddening as it was, she and Riddle did eventually develop a system of sorts. The DA tended to meet in the first half of the week or on weekends, and Riddle tended to favor the end of the week, which he begrudgingly admitted after she insisted he commit to a preference. They both started to plan around that and got along slightly better. For perhaps three or four weeks, Hermione began to feel as though maybe, _possibly,_  they would be able to work this thing out after all.

Alas, she should have known better than to trust any system for long; out of sheer foolishness, she failed to anticipate the one issue that was quickly eclipsing all usual worries as her biggest problem: Tom Riddle’s ego.

One Wednesday afternoon, four hours before the scheduled DA meeting while she was walking through the corridor towards the library to study, a hand reached out of the shadows and grabbed her arm, yanking her into a crevice.

“Hey!” she yelped as she suddenly found herself face to face with a green and silver tie. Scowling, she looked up into Riddle’s face as he stared down at her, his usual unimpressed expression in place.

“Granger. I need to use the Room tonight,” he said without preamble.  

“ _What_? No!” Hermione twisted her arm away from his grasp and attempted to step out of the crevice, but he put his arm out to stop her. She scowled. “We agreed last week that you would be using it on Tuesday and Friday!” she reminded him, resisting the now not-uncommon urge to throttle this obnoxious boy. “Harry’s already set the DA coins, everyone's rearranged their schedules—”

“I don’t care,” he drawled. Hermione gaped up at him as he went on, “I have a very important project that we were unable to finish last night and we need to get it done as soon as possible.”

“And you couldn’t have mentioned this _earlier_?”

“This is the first time you’ve been even remotely secluded all day. Would it not have looked suspicious if I’d traipsed over to the Gryffindor table during breakfast and asked for a chat?”

Unable to deny him, Hermione gritted her teeth. “ _Still_ ,” she said after a moment. “This is completely out of line! The Room was ours first, and you really need to respect that, or—”

“Or what? You’ll report me to a Professor?” Riddle smirked, and she found herself questioning her generally positive stance on nonviolence for about the hundredth time since having to deal with him. “Let’s not forget that this is a highly illegal thing we’re both doing. I wonder who would be punished more harshly if we’re caught, you and Potter, or me and my friends? Umbridge feels rather neutral towards us, for the most part. You, on the other hand…”

How _dare_ he manipulate her like this! She opened her mouth, ready to lay into him, but he spoke again. “Granger, I’m not bending on this. If you want to put up a fuss, go ahead. Shout, complain, hex me even; then we’ll both be caught and they’re certain to ask what it’s about. And I _certainly_ wouldn’t lie to a Professor!” He said, his eyes round with mock-innocence.

Hermione scowled up at him, but could think of nothing to say. Had he really won, just like that? He seemed to think so, as he smirked one last time and then slipped out of the crevice, disappearing into the flow of students.

She just stood where he’d left her, sheer disbelief at his arrogance holding her motionless. How on _earth_ could there exist a human being as narcissistic, as self-absorbed, as insensitive, obtuse, and arrogant as Tom Riddle? And exactly which religion’s gods had she offended to saddle _herself_ with the misfortune of having to negotiate with him? He must think he was so _cunning_ , coming to her with a valid excuse for not telling her about his arbitrary change in their plans earlier, giving her no time to argue or figure out a way to compromise. There was a strong possibility that the DA would in fact have to cancel their meeting tonight, which would disappoint so many people, not to mention cost them a night of training that they were sure to one day need… Hermione gritted her teeth.   

She’d been doing that a lot lately, and as the daughter of dentists, she quite resented Riddle for forcing her into such a habit. At the rate things were going, her teeth were sure to be terribly worn down by the end of the year. Perhaps she would send the bill for necessary repairs to him.

Eventually she forced herself to move again, vaguely wandering in the direction of the library while really trying to think of a quick solution. The thing was, the DA meeting wouldn’t start until eight o’clock, and she knew that Riddle’s crew would gather there far earlier and set the Room of Requirement to their specifications. It was highly unlikely they would be able to convince them to leave when the time came. Knowing how stubborn and volatile the personalities on both sides were, it could quite possibly turn into a fight, which was one of the last things they needed right now. If only there were someone who could get there even earlier, to hold the room open for the DA. She couldn’t do it herself, there was a short Prefect’s meeting after dinner…  

But wait! There _was_ someone who would be willing to hold the Room for them! Someone who’d shown themselves to be more than eager to assist Harry whenever he needed it, who was just crazy enough to stand up to Riddle on their behalf.

And someone who would, quite probably, get under Riddle’s skin and annoy the hell out of _him_ for a change. Grinning, Hermione changed her course, heading now towards the kitchens with a newfound spring to her step. Oh, payback was going to be _so_ sweet.  

**—0—**

Tom made a habit of arriving at the Room of Requirement a few minutes before he told his followers to. That gave him a bit of extra time to get things set up, organize his thoughts, and ensure that he would be utterly composed and poised once others stepped into the Room. He’d found that having a leader who projected an air of flawless command truly did inspire followers to strive towards perfection; if he wanted the best, he himself had to be the best. And he certainly didn’t mind being the best.

So after leaving dinner early, he began to mount the stairs to the seventh floor. As he walked, he reflected on his earlier confrontation with Granger. It had been most amusing; she was always _so_ easy to get angry and worked up. Well, most Gryffindors were, but when it was her, he truly enjoyed it. Maybe it was because she’d always had that smug, ‘holier-than-thou’ attitude towards him and his housemates, or because she’d always been annoyingly close to him in class and it was nice to definitively have the upper hand for once. Yes, he was finally getting a chance to show her who was in charge here…

He had in truth been less than honest about the urgency of their project, but last week Benedict had complained about how Tom was letting Granger and Potter’s gang push them around and dictate terms. He said it was unacceptable, and frankly Tom agreed. His “collaboration” with Granger had only been supposed to last a week or two at the most, but had slowly been getting out of hand. And as time went on, she seemed to be getting far too _comfortable_ with him. Last time they’d met, she hadn’t even been phased by his tiny veiled threats, and had refused to bend to his will! It was about time he brought the situation back under his control.    

When he turned the corner into the corridor that hid the Room of Requirement, he was brought up short by the sight that awaited him. The door that normally wouldn’t materialize until it was summoned was already there on the wall. With mounting suspicion he strode over and flung it open, only to have his hunch confirmed: waiting inside was not the elegant meeting room slash specialized dark magic library the Room created for him, but a much larger room, full of dark detectors and fluffy cushions and ample floor space. It was obvious he was looking at the meeting room of the so-called “Dumbledore’s Army”.

Whatever trick Granger was trying to pull wasn’t going to work! He pulled the door shut again and furiously started pacing, mentally commanding it to revert to its proper form. Once he’d passed it three times, he looked in again, only to find it still stuck in the wrong configuration. Something wasn’t right; Granger must have done something…

He stepped into the Room and slammed the door shut behind him, and then furiously began searching for some sign of whatever trick that swotty Gryffindor was trying to pull. Had she enchanted it somehow? Confunded the Room itself? Come up with a way to ask the Room to be permanent? Whatever it was, he was going to find it and make it _stop_. Tom pulled the books off the shelves, dug through the pile of cushions, poked at all of the dark detectors with his wand… Nothing. He walked into the center of the room again and looked over the chaos he had caused, no closer to figuring out this vexing new puzzle.

“Is you perhaps Master Riddle?” A high-pitched voice squeaked from behind him.

Tom spun around and looked down to find himself staring into the large, blinking eyes of a house elf. It wore the typical uniform of the castle elves, but it also had six different badly-knitted hats arranged atop its tiny head, and at least a dozen pairs of socks pulled up on its stick-thin legs. Tom stared at it in shock for a moment before shaking his head. “Who the hell are you?” he demanded, his hand creeping into his pocket and grasping at his wand in case he didn’t get a quick enough answer.

“I is Dobby, the Free elf!” The creature pronounced boldly, apparently unaware of the threatening glimmer in Tom’s eyes. “And _you_ is bad mean Slytherin who went back on your word and is trying to hurt Harry Potter!”

“Granger put you up to this, didn't she?” Tom said darkly, the pieces clicking into place. If he remembered correctly, he _had_ heard something last year about her and house elves… “You’re keeping the room open for her so I can’t do my work.”

The house elf beamed. “Miss Granger is a friend of Harry Potter. She is good and smart and kind to House Elves!”

“Yes, she’s a saint,” Tom growled. His fist tightened around his wand and he considered pulling it out and taking care of this issue quickly and definitively. However, he was pretty sure maiming one of the school elves would result in at _least_ some detentions, if not a steep fine… He could at least give the ‘diplomatic’ approach first. “Listen, Bobby—”

“Dobby!” The creature shouted, its face screwing up in indingation.

“Fine, _Dobby_ ,” Tom snapped, crossing his arms. “I can see that you’re trying to do Granger a favor or whatnot, but it would really be best if you left now. You have no idea what I’m capable of, and it’s really not wise to cross me.”

“Miss Granger says you will say that,” Dobby said, nodding its tiny head and looking thoroughly unaffected by his statement. “And she also says to not listen, that you can not go through with threats.”

“She thinks I can’t make good on my threats?” Tom snarled, yanking out his wand and training it on the bothersome little creature. He’d be damned if he let a _house elf_ flaunt him, especially on Granger’s orders. “I’ll show her how serious I am! _Flipendo_!”

The second Tom had drawn his wand, the creature had snapped its long bony fingers. There was a loud _crack_ , and before his curse could hit, the house elf had vanished, only to reappear across the room, sitting atop one of the cushions Tom had left strewn about.

“What in Salazar’s name—did you just apparate?” Tom sputtered. “You can’t apparate inside the castle! There are wards!”

“That’s only for wizards; house elves can do as they please,” Dobby squeaked, smiling at Tom innocently.

With mounting fury, he aimed again, only for the creature to repeat its vanishing act. This time he reappeared on top of a bookcase, which Tom immediately cast a _Bombarda_ at. The small explosion tore it apart, and he eagerly expected the mess of broken wood and scattered books for a sign of victory, but the house elf’s form was not there.

“Miss Granger said Mr. Riddle was a talented and smart wizard, but Dobby sees no evidence of this,” Dobby squaked from behind him.

Tom spun around again to find him standing a few steps away, smiling and blinking innocently. He scowled deeply, rolling his wand back and forth in his fingers. How _dare_ that creature insult him? He was considering how he might curse it again, only _faster_ , when the door opened behind him.

“Riddle? What’s going on? Where’s our room?”

“What’s the Malfoys’ crazy old house elf doing here?”

Tom took a deep breath and tried to master his expression so not to appear flustered, and then turned around to calmly face his followers. Blaise, Theo, and Benedict had all arrived.

“It appears that Granger has attempted to thwart us, and—wait, this elf was Malfoy’s?”

Benedict nodded as he came to stand beside Tom. Unlike Tom, he was from a wealthy pureblood family, but he had little patience for the old-fashioned rules and idiotic nepotism that pervaded that circle, so Tom had been able to convince him to join his faction instead. It certainly had helped Tom’s case that Benedict had the unfortunate experience of growing up as cousin and forced playmate to that pompous arse, Draco Malfoy. “Yes, but Potter tricked Draco into freeing it second-year when it was helping him pack. Lucius was furious and kept him grounded for half the summer; it was hilarious.”

“Harry Potter is good kind wizard who saved Dobby from evil Malfoys!” The house elf exclaimed, its eyes lighting up when it mentioned that obnoxious Gryffindor. “Dobby is eternally grateful to Harry Potter and will gladly help him and his friends!”

Tom gritted his teeth. So not only had Granger outsmarted him, but she’d saddled him with a house elf that hero worshipped Harry _freakin_ Potter. Wonderful.

“So what do we do? Curse it?” Theo said, coming to stand on the other side of Tom.

“Be my guest,” Tom grumbled. Theo smirked and pulled out his wand. Before a spell could even leave his mouth, there was another loud _crack_ and Dobby vanished, only to reappear on the other side of the Room and then duck behind a bookshelf.

Theo gaped at the empty space where his target had just been. “Bloody hell! That thing can apparate in here?”

“I suppose it makes sense,” Blaise said from behind them. Tom glanced back and saw that the dark skinned Italian had elected to lean back against the wall and smirk rather than join their pursuit of the rogue elf. “Wizards tend not to think about house elves, so most warding spells don’t bother to account for the differences in their magic.”

Tom scowled at him. The fact was interesting, and Tom made a note of it for future reference, but it wasn’t much help to them _now_. “Well, what do you propose we do about the situation? As long as it’s in here, we can’t get into our meeting Room.”

Blaise shrugged and smiled deviously. “We could have it here? There are all these cushions, so it’s not like we don’t have somewhere to sit.”

Tom clenched his fists. The Knights of Walpurgis would _not_ have their meeting while sitting cross-legged on poofy floor cushions! “We will not stoop to their level by using their clubhouse,” he snapped, glaring at his friend. “I’m sure Granger hasn’t told them their meeting is cancelled, so they’re going to show up at some point, and if this room is still here they’ll have no reason not to stay.”

A long, blissful sigh came from behind him. “Ok, but when you switch it back to our room, could you keep these? They’re about five times more comfortable than those scary-looking chairs we use.”

Tom turned around to see that Theo had splayed himself out on one of the cushions he’d thrown around the room earlier. “Don’t lay on those!” He said sharply. “And our chairs aren’t _scary_ , they’re elegant! We can’t use their stuff. It would compromise our principals—”

Theo scoffed, quite disrespectfully. “Please, it’s not about our principals, it’s about our appearance. And if you care that much about maintaining our aesthetic, then get these cushions, but in black!”

“Maybe leather,” Blaise added as he sank down into a cushion of his own.

“This isn’t a joke,” Tom said through gritted teeth. Was _no one_ intimidated by him today? He was losing his touch. “We need to figure out how to remove that _creature_ at once, before Potter’s horde arrives.”

Blaise didn’t move from his reclined position, but merely raised his brows at Tom. “Well, have you tried asking him what he wants, or did you go straight to threats and curses?”

Tom’s opened his mouth to deny it, but stopped when he realized that… he hadn’t actually tried the obvious thing and simply asked the house elf to leave. He’d normally hate to do something as debasing as bargaining with a servile creature, especially in front of the Knights, but time was of the essence. If he waited, he might suffer the far worse humiliation of having Granger outsmart him in front of all her friends. He turned and walked over to the bookcase the creature had taken refuge behind with his head held high, determined to remain as dignified as possible.

Once he was standing in front of the bookshelf, he cleared his throat and said, “Well… Dobby, I’m afraid I might have been a bit… forceful, when we talked earlier. I suppose I should have begun by asking if you would vacate this room?”

“Tom Riddle only asked Dobby because his friend told him to,” the creature squeaked from its hiding spot. “Dobby will not negotiate with callous oath-breakers!”

Tom sighed. He should have seen that one coming. “Isn’t there _any_ way to get you to leave?” he said, hating how desperate he sounded. “You appear to like socks, would you like someone’s socks?”

“Dobby shall leave this Room when Hermione Granger returns and tells him it is time, and not a second before!” the hidden house elf declared.

Tom suppressed a groan; that was not the solution he’d been hoping for. Nonetheless he turned to his followers and asked, “Where’s Granger? Is she still at dinner, or has she gone back to her common room?”

“Nah, the Prefects have a meeting tonight,” Theo said, his eyes closed. “She’ll be there.”

Tom pursed his lips for a moment. “One of you will have to go and fetch her,” he said decidedly. “Then I shall convince her to remove that… thing.”

“Don’t make me go, I’m too comfortable,” Theo muttered.

Tom was on the verge of ordering him to do it just because of that statement when the sound of the door opening again caught his attention and he turned. Tracey and Carina had arrived, almost a full ten minutes late. They were arm in arm and giggling, looking not the least bit concerned with their punctuality, and if there hadn’t been more pressing issues, Tom probably would have lectured them about that.

The two female Knights froze in the doorway and looked around the Room in confusion before their eyes landed on the boys.

Carina smirked at Tom. “Your cunning plan to outwit Granger has failed, I see.”

“Not yet,” Tom said, crossing his arms. “I want you to go to down to where the Prefects are having their meeting and bring her here as soon as she gets out.” Out of all his followers, Carina was the best choice because her family connections meant she wouldn’t be harassed by Malfoy and Parkinson. Benedict or Theo could probably get away with it too, but he didn’t trust them to get along with Granger long enough to get her to the Room.  

Carina nodded and turned, leaving just as quickly as she’d come.

“Do you really think you’ll be able to get Granger to give in?” Blaise asked, raising his eyebrows in an expression of bemused doubt.

Tom scowled. “Of course I will; I’m very persuasive when I need to be.”

Theo coughed loudly, and Blaise rolled his eyes. Tracey just walked over and patted Tom on the arm.

“We’ll be excited to watch, then,” Tracey cooed, her voice terribly patronizing.

Tom glowered at her, and then glanced at Benedict, who remained standing impassively off to the side. As he was the only one to not express doubt in Tom’s abilities, he was currently the favorite.

“Anyway, his plan failed; that’s five Galleons you each owe me,” Tracey announced. Blaise sighed and started fishing through his pockets, but Theo shook his head.

“Not _quite_ yet; maybe he’ll pull off this last attempt.”

“Fine, pay me later.”

Tom scowled at the three of them. “I thought I told you all to stop making bets about me.”

Tracey shrugged before stepping over and collapsing on an empty cushion next to Theo and Blaise. “Yes, but I’m poor, they’re gullible, and you’re terribly lucrative—Merlin, these are comfortable! Why don’t you ever ask for _these_ instead of those pain-in-the-arse chairs?”    


End file.
